Question
by LadyBird
Summary: Ichigo POV, thinking about Urahara. Sort of tied to my other Bleach fics - for explanation see Author's notes.


**Disclaimer: **Not mine, writing for fun (if a compulsion to write strong enough to not let you sleep sometimes can be called fun), making no money out of it (too bad).

**Rating: K+**

**Pairing:** vaguely Ichigo/Urahara-wards.

**Summary:** Ichigo thinks about Urahara. For an explanation see A/N.

**A/N:** All right, let me explain. So, I'm writing a Bleach Ichigo-centric gen fanfic that has Ichigo dying and ending up in the Soul Society (predicable). He can't remember anything (perhaps not so predicable). I'm stuck at the third chapter (I wrote fourth and fifth chapter and the epilogue and then noticed I had messed up my fic timeline. Getting a _good_ and _workable _idea how to sort it out is, obviously, going to take some more time.

The fic, „Journey", is gen (okay, there's a background Ganjyu/Hanatarou pairing, but it's sort of mentioned only). However, in my own mind „Journey" is a part of my Bleach contiuum that starts with **"Fact of Life"** and continues in **"What was is".** Both fics are sort of pre-Ichigo/Urahara. So…

I wrote a **"Journey"** ficlet which ties the fics together. Sort of. Here it is. Also, warning for spoilers of future chapters of "Journey" (a little, at least).

_**Question (Ichigo)**_

_Who are you?_

There's a question in my mind that I can't find an answer to. Actually, there are a lot of questions, but almost all others I can ask. There are people who will answer. And if they do not know the answer, they will find out. But... this question... I don't know how to ask.

I have forgotten a lot. Almost everything about the life I had before arriving in the Soul Society. I do know that I had one. A life, that is. There are people - friends - who tell me about it. I know that I have forgotten people I knew and cared for. But I can ask about them and I am told. Karin and Yuzu - those names might have started out just as words, but hearing them has given me an impression of remembering. I know what they look like... or at least what they looked like when I last saw them. I remember them. Their voices. Their smiles - or, in Karin's case, her scowl. There are pictures in my mind about them, about the things we did together. I do not remember much about them, but I do remember them. I remember my father.

And there are other names. Kuchiki Rukia. Abarai Renji. Yasutora Sado - Chad, I called him. Arisawa Tatsuki. Inoue Orihime. Ishida Uuryu. Friends. Partners. I know what they look like, I know what they meant to me. Also, I do not remember much, but I remember them.

And others - Kuchiki Byakuya, Zaraki Kenpachi, Hitsugaya Toushiro, Unohana Retsu, Madarame Ikkaku. There are many names I know now.

Bount. Vizards. Hollow. Arrancar. Espada. Words and names that Ganjyu knows, I now remember.

But that's exactly it - I remember those that I am told about. All those people Ganjyu and Kuukaku and Hanatarou have told me about. They ask: "Do you remember..." and when they say a name I remember. Not much, but I remember.

But what about those they do not know about? Or do not think to ask about? There haven't been one person I have remembered by myself. Shiro doesn't count. He's me. Or at least I do not count Shiro. Not one person... Except... Who _are_ you? Who are you that I remembered when I was leaving the old woman I met in Rukonkai? Who are you, who I know I sometimes see in my dreams, but can hardly recall when I wake? Who are you that the faint memory of you can make Shiro tremble and laugh and go silent all at once? Who are you, who I can't remember?

Who are you, who I am afraid to ask about?

Are you even real? Have you existed in my life? Or are you really just a dream? Something my imagination conjured up because my mind couldn't bear not remembering anybody? Because if you existed - if you existed, you must have been important to me. I couldn't remember my family without being told about them, but I could remember you. Somebody like that, somebody so important to me - I would have been told about. Right? Ganjyu knows the people I met in the Soul Society - he told me about them. Ganjyu spent quite a lot of time in the Living world - he knows people who were important to me there. He must know you. If you were real he _must_ know you. He would have told me about you.

It would be so easy - just to ask. Just to sit down with him and, and say: "See, Ganjyu, there's somebody I have been remembering about, but I can't place the name on. He looks like..." It would be easy to ask.

But what if he just looks at me in puzzlement and says there was nobody like that? What if...

So you see, I am afraid to ask. I don't want to know... If I have just dreamed you up, I don't want to know that. I want to believe you are real. That you were part of my life. That I will remember you. I have to believe that. I don't know why, but I _have_ to. After all, I have remembered a little bit about you by myself. That's something that has not happened with anybody else. So it means I must in time remember you, right? I must. I _will_.

But still... I'd like to know. Right now.

_Who are you?_


End file.
